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Puerto Araujo – Landázuri – Barbosa

When I left Puerto Araujo it was raining lightly, but it wasn’t a cold rain, so I did not really care. In the beginning the road continued pretty flat, but soon it began to ascend and descend until Cimitarra, where I stopped for breakfast. While I was having breakfast a man began to talk to me, and we ended up talking for an hour or so, until I decided it was time to leave. It’s only 32km from Cimitarra to Landázuri, but I was aware that a harder climb would begin soon ...

The beginning wasn’t that hard. But in addition to the climb there were roadworks, which meant there were stretches of the road without tarmac and in a really bad state, more appropriate for a mountain bike (which I don’t have). The last 15km were the hardest, with the climb up to 900m. I needed quite some time to get to Landázuri, and lots of breaks with some lemonade (and refilling of my water bottles).

Notwithstanding the hard climb, the views were fantastic...

When I arrived at Landázuri the first thing was to look for a hotel – a simple task in a small village. After taking a shower I went out again to eat something (in a bakery) and drink some juice. I also did a small walk – I wasn’t capable of more – and then went back to the hotel to rest. In the evening I found a pizza stall at the main square, and they did some vegetarian pizza for me. There was also quite some interest in this gringo with red hair, and I talked with the pizza person and other people around while I was waiting for my pizza and having a beer. He had been to Mallorca a few years ago but had returned before his time was up because of the discrimination he suffered (Spanish racism towards people above all from the poorer countries of Latin America).

I went back to the hotel to sleep early.

The next day in the end I took a bus from Landázuri to Barbosa. It’s a hard route – a climb of 1700m – and after I was told that in addition the road is pretty bad, I decided to take the bus. The bus needed 3 hours for 70km – and yes, the road was pretty bad ...

In Barbosa I found a decent hotel pretty quickly, and I had an afternoon of resting (and of planning the route up to Bogota).